Avnet Employees Jazz up Arizona School

For the 23rd straight year, more than 150 Avnet employees, friends and family dedicated a recent Saturday morning to clean classrooms, paint murals, construct tables and plant flowers for the HandsOn Greater Phoenix’s Serve-A-Thon. This year, the Avnet group was assigned to Jefferson Elementary in Mesa, Ariz., USA.

After Avnet was assigned to complete 11 projects at Jefferson, Lise Moskop, Technology Solutions Americas’ supply chain manager and Serve-A-Thon project manager, went to work recruiting volunteers and project leads who would get the job done.

Teams worked together for four hours to complete all the beautification projects, often moving to help finish a second project once their first project was completed. “While all the finished projects looked beautiful, the most rewarding project was the creation of the Family Resource Center’s Free Store,” says Toni Ramsey, Avnet’s community programs manager and project leader. “It was amazing to see this old storage space cleaned and organized so that the donated food, clothing, shoes and toiletries were displayed like a real store.”

Employees brought donations for the Family Resource Center, which provides food, gently used clothing, hygiene supplies and school supplies to support the students’ basic needs and help them achieve their best in school. Moreover, the more than 300 volunteer hours provided by more than 60 Avnet employees generated a $3,000 Avnet Cares Dollars for Doers donation.

The Avnet team joined more than 1,500 volunteers from the Greater Phoenix area in refreshing and revitalizing hundreds of local nonprofits, schools and community groups.

“We couldn’t have completed any of this work without the countless hours and efforts of all the project leaders,” says Ramsey. “Everyone did a tremendous job and we continue our Serve-A-Thon legacy as the company the schools ask for to get things done in a day!”